I thought his point was fairly clear. Are you being intentionally obtuse?

Back on topic, I think like most, that TARP made our crash not so steep and jagged, but it is hard to quantify how bad things might have gotten. So, those who choose not to believe this are only forced to ignore soft, not hard facts.

A stable banking system is essential for a modern economy to function. They had to do something. And it did help to stabilize the banks.

But the terms sure seemed to favor the banks. Some of the banks have paid back the taxpayer money with interest, while others have defaulted. So if your measure of success is whether the banks all paid back every last dime, we won't know for some time.

The bailout succeeded in its intent to save certain banks from failure. However, they were supposed to LEND once they were off life support, and they haven't. So TARP was half successful -- it saved the banks but not the parts of the economy (very large parts) that depend on loans.

If the Republicans had written the TARP legislation not only to require the banks to keep their money in circulation but also to dismantle the "too large to fail" recipients of TARP funds and break them into parts that could succeed or fail based on the soundness of their business decisions and their cooperation with legislation in the public interest, the public would be better off.

Lessee...We're talking about the Bush Administration recovery for the banksters that the Dem Congress agreed to in the Fall of 2008, yes? Because, the teabaggers want everybody to think it was all Barack Satan Obama's and the Demoncrats' doing.

We're in a shitty recession and not the largest economic collapse ever. If that's what you call a success, then "whee..." But no sane or smart person should fall for the "NO MORE DEMOCRAT BAILOUTS!" crap that's being sold now (see Lee, Chad). It redefines the term "Disingenuous".

cloudy wrote:Did it work? Yes. The government will profit billions of dollars fromthe program. http://goo.gl/YPxx

That article is poorly written and poorly sourced.

That's because last year CBO thought TARP would be much worse off, losing $356 billion in the program's lifetime; the agency went ahead and recorded $151 billion in subsidy costs for 2009. Since CBO's new, lower estimate on TARP's cost is $99 billion, to make up for last year's overly pessimistic outlook, it's recording a $67 billion profit on TARP for 2010.

TARP makes the budget calculation look better this year because a gargantuan chunk of change was preemptively cut loose last year. The article says that the re-estimated cost of TARP is $99b, but also says that TARP will earn a $7b profit. I'm confused.

Michael Patrick wrote:A stable banking system is essential for a modern economy to function. They had to do something. And it did help to stabilize the banks.

Do you think that a few dominant, ubiquitous megabanks (Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase etc.) constitute a stable banking system?

Aceraser said that TARP kept the collapse from being too steep and jagged. Fair enough, but I tend to think that it might be more stable down there on the flatlands, instead of staying up here on the edge of this cliff.

Under any economy, those who rent out money live on easy street. They lend money, take security, and live off the rich harvest of interest and the proceeds of forced sales. The money lenders are able to enjoy comfort and luxury without doing any productive labor. It is the borrowing producers who pay the interest or lose their asses. The restrictive and coercive economic pressures will continue.

Stella_Guru wrote:Under any economy, those who rent out money live on easy street. They lend money, take security, and live off the rich harvest of interest and the proceeds of forced sales. The money lenders are able to enjoy comfort and luxury without doing any productive labor. It is the borrowing producers who pay the interest or lose their asses. The restrictive and coercive economic pressures will continue.

Of course it worked. Imagine what would have happened to this country if AIG, Citibank, and the others had actually failed? Most of the banks in the country would have failed also, which means that most citizens would have lost their savings.

"Oh, but the FDIC insures those savings." Yes, and that is the govt bailing the people out, and they simply wouldn't have enough cash on hand to bail out all the nation's savings.

People were predicting a crash comparable to the Great Depression, with unemployment well over 20%. If GM had been allowed to fail along with the major banks, that's EXACTLY what we'd have seen in this country, and it would have spread across the world, making the 1930's look like a party.

I think there were better ways to save the banks, without guaranteeing the crappy options that were sold on mortgages. I would have had the govt just nationalize the banks, and tell the owners of those options that they had nothing anymore. With this route, we wouldn't be bailing out the billionaires, we would own the whole thing as a nation.

Of course, this smacks too much of socialism for many people, even though it would have probably put far less money in the pockets of the fat cats, and achieved the same results--freeing up money to lend to businesses.

Stella_Guru wrote:Under any economy, those who rent out money live on easy street. They lend money, take security, and live off the rich harvest of interest and the proceeds of forced sales. The money lenders are able to enjoy comfort and luxury without doing any productive labor. It is the borrowing producers who pay the interest or lose their asses. The restrictive and coercive economic pressures will continue.

I'm wondering if you have any suggestions about how we fight back?

As we live in the present, so is our future shaped, channeled and largely determined. As far as possible live on a cash and carry basis; no bank loans, no slavery to interest on mortgages, notes, and IOU's. Do not be part of a competitive, acquisitive, aggressive, war-making social order which butchers for food and murders for sport and power. The closer you come to it the more completely you are part of it. If you reject it in theory, shouldn't you, as far as possible, reject it also in practice? President Obama should be asked this question.